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Receipt for Soda Biscuits

Soda biscuits are quick biscuits made with baking soda, cream of tartar, butter, milk, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Receipt for Soda Biscuits

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Sift the flour into a bowl and sift the cream of tartar through it. Add the salt and mix well.

  2. Rub the butter into the flour with your hands.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in 1 teaspoon of hot water and add it to the milk.

  4. Gradually add the milk to the flour, stirring first, then knead quickly for 2-3 minutes until smooth.

Shape and bake

  1. Sprinkle flour on a surface, roll out the dough, and cut out biscuits.

  2. Place the biscuits in buttered baking pans and immediately put them in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C).

  3. Bake for 20-40 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the biscuits as its proteins and starches set in the oven.
Cold milk
Supplies the liquid that hydrates the flour and gives the dough moisture for a tender crumb.
Butter
Rubbed into the flour to add fat, which tenderizes the crumb and adds richness.
Baking soda
Reacts with the cream of tartar and milk acid to produce carbon dioxide, which makes the biscuits rise.
Cream of tartar
Acts as an acid that reacts with the baking soda to release gas for lift.

The step that matters

Knead quickly after adding the milk. Overworking wheat flour once liquid is added develops gluten, which toughens the biscuits. A quick, light knead keeps them tender while still bringing the dough together.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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